John Tenta couldn't be further from the monstrous Earthquake character WWF fans loved to hate; as his career faded, a health battle threatened to take him from the family he loved.
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00:00Damn straight I'm seeing dollar signs of somebody like John Tanner walk through the door.
00:10Who's the biggest, baddest son of a bitch on the planet?
00:13I'd have him squash all those little bastards.
00:15With a superhero, you need a villain that's just as powerful to counter.
00:20You needed somebody like my dad.
00:22You are gonna fail the earthquake!
00:24You know it was over because he'd go like this across his throat,
00:28jump a couple times around your head.
00:30The tremors are beginning!
00:31Run to the set of ropes and then just jump on your chest.
00:34Kaboom!
00:35The earthquake splashed man.
00:37Larger than life John Tanta had a meteoric rise in the WWF's earthquake
00:42before being paired with another big man Typhoon
00:45in the iconic tag team The Natural Disasters.
00:48It's bad weather for everybody in the WWF.
00:52Natural Disasters, Earthquake and Typhoon.
00:55A thousand pounds of fun.
00:56There was no picking them guys up, put it that way.
00:58You go to lift them and, you know, blow your back out type situations.
01:02Intimidating in the ring, behind the scenes, John Tanta was a very different man.
01:07They were gentlemen, respected by everybody.
01:09Everybody could count on John Tanta to do the job and do it right.
01:12No doubt about that.
01:13My dad was a good guy, regardless if he was a heel or not.
01:16He cared deeply about his family and he also cared a lot about other people.
01:21It's not a very dark side of the wrestling, huh?
01:23But a change in fortune for both men
01:26Turned these once respected superstars into parodies of themselves.
01:33He was so many gimmicks.
01:35It was probably hard from the tape.
01:37I felt like that was the low of the low frame.
01:39Mitch McMahon can put you on the stars or he can put you in hell.
01:43Just that simple.
01:44You don't walk out on Mitch McMahon.
01:46If you do, you're gonna pay for it.
01:48I don't think John gave a damn.
01:50It's the main important thing to make the money to take care of his family.
01:54And for John Tanta and his family, a cruel ending that no one saw coming.
01:59John doesn't want to go to the doctor.
02:01He waited too long.
02:03My dad's a fighter.
02:04He's gonna fight through this.
02:05There's no way this will take him down.
02:07I just prayed, God, please heal him.
02:09Please let us have more time with our dad.
02:11Dino Bravo just told me that I can pick the largest man, the biggest man in the audience right now
02:27and bring him into the ring and he can get on Dino Bravo's back.
02:30Dino Bravo and the Ultimate Warrior were having a push-up contest in the middle of the ring.
02:35And the gimmick was to find the biggest guy in the stands and to call him down.
02:41The whole audience already realized there was this giant man in the audience
02:45that would be perfect to be in this competition.
02:48Wow.
02:49Oh, my goodness.
02:50When my dad made his debut in the WWE, he was planted in the audience.
02:55Take a look at the size of this man.
02:58Jimmy Hart called him down.
03:00John from West Virginia.
03:03And he's wearing this bright blue shirt, jeans and white shoes, looking like a dad.
03:09And so he's sitting on Ultimate Warrior's back.
03:12Then he just smashes him.
03:15Wait a minute!
03:16Whoa!
03:17Bravo!
03:18We see the first iteration of the Earthquake Splash
03:21and establishing himself as a pretty major heel.
03:24Felt of a man down across the chest!
03:27Hey, this guy learned how to wrestle pretty quick!
03:29Yeah, no kidding!
03:30I smell a rat!
03:32That's how he's introduced into the wrestling world.
03:35My name's Jeff Tenta and Earthquake's my father.
03:40Everybody knew me as Lil' Quake.
03:42Everybody knew my dad.
03:43I was just in the backstage a lot of times when he was wrestling.
03:47I can honestly say that he was definitely respected.
03:50My dad told you to keep an eye on my kid.
03:53They were gonna do it.
03:54It was kind of surreal being backstage.
03:57I've watched these wrestlers and their own personas and their gimmicks just kind of doing their thing, just talking to each other.
04:03I'm Joanna, and I'm the daughter of Earthquake, John Tenta.
04:09I did want to be a wrestler.
04:12I still love wrestling today, and growing up I thought there was nobody cooler than my dad.
04:17My name is John Tenta, the youngest child of John, Earthquake, and Josephine Tenta.
04:23My dad was good at making the audience buy into this villain.
04:28I think he was incredible in the ring.
04:30When John Tenta debuts in WWF in 1989, he's already had a storied career that has taken him halfway around the world from his hometown of Surrey, British Columbia.
04:41My dad knew that he wanted to become a wrestler from a very young age.
04:46My grandfather was also a huge wrestling fan, and so they only got a few channels, but they would always tune in to watch wrestling.
04:53From that moment on, he was hooked. He knew that that was what he wanted to do.
04:58My grandmother and grandfather were not wealthy people.
05:01They couldn't afford to buy him a weight set or get him into extracurricular sports and things like that, so he found other ways to exercise.
05:07Going to the parks, lifting park benches, or doing whatever he could to just get stronger.
05:13They believed in him from the beginning.
05:15He was a Canadian world champion in wrestling, and he was being prospected by 12 major universities in the US.
05:22And we know that he ended up going to LSU and wrestling there.
05:26But when they dropped their wrestling program, he found wrestling in other ways.
05:30The oldest Japanese sport is sumo, a form of wrestling which dates back to hand-to-hand combat techniques of nearly 20 centuries ago.
05:39John Tenta was 22 years old.
05:41One of the sumo wrestling stables came to college wrestling meet and recruited him when he was in Louisiana State University.
05:49He quit college and came to Japan to live and start as a sumo wrestler.
05:53Hello, my name is Fumi Saito. I'm a journalist. I'm an author. I'm a wrestling historian.
05:59Sumo is Japanese national sport. They still wear kimonos. They have samurai hairdos.
06:06And sumo wrestler is like Moraka. Sumo society.
06:11Sumo is different. The way they train, the discipline, you have to fight for it.
06:19My name is Haku. I've been with wrestling for 40 years.
06:25For wrestling, you climb over the top rope and jump. Sumo is more underground and more physical.
06:34John was probably the tallest one of that time, and he was big too.
06:40I believe they were looking at him to be a grand champion.
06:45He went into three consecutive tournaments and won all three tournaments.
06:52He was basically undefeated for eight months period until he decided to walk out.
06:58I like sumo. I like the sport. But I just can't live the lifestyle.
07:03There's a lot of demands and a lot of pressure put on you. I had to do anything that my senior wrestlers asked me.
07:10And when I interviewed him the following year, he felt that he always wanted to be professional wrestler.
07:19That was his goal. He was signed with All Japan Pro Wrestling in July of 1986.
07:25He basically learned from the Japanese side and American side together.
07:29He enjoyed professional wrestling a lot more than he enjoyed sumo wrestling. That's for sure.
07:35He learned the customs and spoke Japanese too.
07:40He was treated more like local now.
07:45My love, there's only John in my life.
07:51It's only John forever.
07:55My name is Josephine and I married with John Earthquake Tenta.
08:03I'm from the Philippines.
08:08Luckily, I got my visa and go to Japan for a singing entertainer.
08:15He went into the place that I was working and my mama-san introduced him to me.
08:21This love at first sight for him and for me.
08:24My mama-san told me he's a wrestler, but I don't know nothing about wrestling.
08:28So to me, so what? He's really famous.
08:33John was 6'7".
08:35And how tall are you?
08:364'11".
08:38It didn't bother me at all.
08:40Don't get it twisted, man. My mom may be barely five foot, but she's the alpha in the house.
08:44I promise you that.
08:45They really are a love story for the ages.
08:48Everything had to be in the right place and set in motion at the right time
08:52for them to even find each other in such a big world.
08:56I know right away that he's a good man and a big heart.
08:59The following year, WWF at the time was already interested in John Tenta as Hulk Hogan's opponent.
09:07And John Tenta asked the company, would it be okay to leave and join WWE?
09:14The great Kabuki, I believe, was the one who told him, go ahead and do it.
09:20That's your chance.
09:22Before accepting the offer from the WWF, John Tenta makes a commitment.
09:27Not just to Josephine, but to her son Jeff as well.
09:31We were a package deal, me and my mom.
09:33And the first time I saw him, he was sitting there in one of our chairs in front of a window
09:37and just his whole body would just cover that whole window.
09:41That's the lasting image I have the first time I meet my father.
09:44Only father I know, so he is my dad.
09:48When they got married shortly after we both flew from Philippines to Canada,
09:53obviously I was a little nervous, a little scared.
09:56Different country, a whole new world.
09:59As John and his family settle in British Columbia,
10:02his WWF career ignites with an in-ring feud against the world champion, Hulk Hogan.
10:08There he is!
10:09World Wrestling Federation Heavyweight Champion!
10:12And he has never looked better!
10:14There's nothing going on in the wrestling business.
10:16It could even be any bigger than the Hulkamanias.
10:19When you come in there and you're working right off on top,
10:22that means you're somebody and you're good.
10:25Hey, this is Earl Hebner and I've been a referee for over 40 years.
10:30John was a special friend of mine, always.
10:33We were all a team.
10:34John knew how to handle the matches, he knew how to make them exciting.
10:39He may have been a rookie, but he had credentials.
10:43He earned it.
10:45Hi, I'm Jake the Snake Roberts,
10:47WWE Superstar and Master of the DDT.
10:51DDT!
10:53DDT, Stone Mountain Georgia!
10:55John took it like he'd been doing it for years.
10:57I couldn't believe when I found out how long he'd been wrestling.
11:00I was amazed.
11:02Hogan tries to go for the finest.
11:04No, no!
11:05It's the spot that everybody wants.
11:07When you're wrestling the champ, you're gonna be paid like a champ.
11:10I think my dad was a great foe for Hulk Hogan because he was one of the only guys that was actually bigger than him.
11:16He was really great at generating heat.
11:18So you needed somebody that you could really hate.
11:20The last time I came face to face with Hulk Hogan, they carried him out on a stretcher.
11:26And all the little Hulkamaniacs cried their little eyes out because they knew Hulkamania was dead.
11:34You wrestle Hogan, you've made it. You're that guy. You're it.
11:40His career was gonna just take off and keep taking off and it was exciting.
11:46The most important match for John Tenta as a professional wrestler happened back in Japan, 1991.
11:53The Tokyo Dome event was Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Bret Hart, all these superstars.
11:59But he was another attraction, former sumo wrestler John Tenta,
12:03against former grand champion of sumo wrestling, Coach Kitao, rookie professional wrestler.
12:09Kitao was not a popular professional wrestler.
12:12He thought he was going to be just the biggest star.
12:15He wasn't.
12:17For Kitao, John Tenta was somebody who tried sumo wrestling for one year and didn't even make it.
12:24And this time, actually, John Tenta was bigger and better than Kitao.
12:30Kitao think that, you know, he was Bruce Lee or something.
12:35He didn't care about the rules, the respect and everything.
12:40The first match, an earthquake drop.
12:50John Tenta pinned Koji Kitao, a former Yokozuna grand champion sumo wrestler.
12:56Oh, Kitao wasn't happy.
12:58I believe second night at Kobe, John was going to go over too, again.
13:03That night, Kitao worked against the booking plan.
13:08We were standing there because we knew already that he was, you know, he might pull something and he did.
13:19Kitao went like this, he was going to poke his eye.
13:25Come on.
13:26We got to have fights.
13:27We got to fight.
13:28And I know when he went for that eye poke, my dad delivered a real kick.
13:32Like an MMA match.
13:35After Kitao disqualified himself from the match to end it and saw it wasn't going anywhere,
13:40grabbed a mic, told everyone that wrestling was fake, that it was all a lie, it was all a scam.
13:45John Tenta, you are fake and this is the whole thing is fake.
13:52And he walked out on the match.
13:54We were all there in the dressing room and John bust in there.
13:59He said, where's that son of a bitch?
14:01I'm going to kick his ass.
14:03It was Kitao who got booed out of the building.
14:06That was the last time Kitao worked for SWS company.
14:11He was fired the next day.
14:13John is very kind.
14:15John is very quiet.
14:17Those are the guys that you got to watch out for.
14:24After former sumo grand champion turned wrestler Koji Katao goes rogue during a match in Japan.
14:34He's fired for his actions.
14:39But for John Tenta, the incident cements his reputation as a true professional.
14:45When John Tenta went back to the States, entire backstage of WWE asked him,
14:50I heard you had shoot match in Japan and you took care of yourself.
14:54Great.
14:56Everybody had so much respect for John Tenta and Earthquake from that day forward.
15:01Oh, look at this.
15:03Earthquake doing his team.
15:05He loved that gimmick.
15:06It made him feel big.
15:07It made him feel like he was a force to be reckoned with.
15:10My dad would always brag about, look, I'm the most hated bad guy.
15:14You know, because he knew he did his job.
15:16Roberts, last week you thought you were real smart trying to put that snake on me.
15:21I'm telling you here and now keep Damien away from me.
15:25I can't stand snakes.
15:27But most of all, I can't stand you.
15:30I hate your guts.
15:32Damien was my pet snake that I loved and trusted.
15:36And I always had the snake with me, you know.
15:38And then at the end of the match, I'd get the snake out and drape it across the fallen opponents.
15:43It was my gimmick.
15:45Jake the snake Roberts with Damien in the bag.
15:48The idea was for him to kill it.
15:51They wanted me to get knocked out of the ring and then Tenta do the damage to the snake
15:56where he jumps on the snake while I'm down and out.
15:59So I would never see it.
16:00And I told him, hell no, that's not the way to do that.
16:03The way to do that is to tie me in the ropes and make me watch it.
16:07Jake always puts Damien underneath the ring.
16:09And at that time, there was another bag underneath the ring.
16:12So he grabbed the bag with it on the center of the ring.
16:15He's got Damien in the ring, but from behind again.
16:18Quick ran into the ropes and gave him this big boom squash.
16:22Don't watch this, folks. Please don't watch it.
16:24No. He's gonna come. Come on. He's down.
16:27No. He's down.
16:29The amazing Oscar performance of Jake, you know, crying and bawling his eyes out while
16:34he watched my dad sit on Damien.
16:40I went to the bag and opened up the bag and seen Damien all crushed, which wasn't Damien.
16:45It was a pair of women's pantyhose full of hamburger meat.
16:50Tragedy here has befallen Jake the Snake Roberts.
16:53We got some letters over it, you know, because it traumatized so many kids.
16:58You know, it's wrestling, for God's sake. Come on.
17:01And not only that, the aftermath after squashing Damien,
17:04there's a segment where he serves Vince McMahon and Bobby the Brain,
17:07some burgers that he'd cooked up, and he called them Quake Burgers,
17:10and that the meat rhymed with Quake.
17:13You think this is funny? I gotta eat.
17:16After my dad feuded with Hulk Hogan and with Jake the Snake,
17:23you know, the storylines were maybe running a little bit thin.
17:26My dad approached Typhoon, or Tugboat, Fred, at the time, to essentially join up.
17:32Hi, this is Fred Ottman, Tugboat, Typhoon, the Shockmaster,
17:37the B-A-double-D big steel man, and also one half of the natural disasters.
17:45What you got?
17:47And I was Superstar Big Bubba, too.
17:50I have a memorable dance contest with Rocky Johnson,
17:54and I got the opportunity to bust a giant boombox over his noggin.
17:58Oh!
18:00Good night!
18:02Fred, you know, he didn't know his own strengths,
18:05and Rocky was laying there in a puddle of blood.
18:07I go, what? You killed him!
18:10That was Fred, or Big Bubba, wrapped up into a ball.
18:15I'm Jerry Sags, one half the infamous tag team, the Nasty Boys.
18:20That's the time we first met Big Bubba, Fred.
18:23He'd become many other gimmicks after that.
18:26The old Tugboat is just like the Battleship Missouri, brother.
18:28He's loaded! He's ready for battle, brother!
18:32Full steam ahead. Tugger's coming to town.
18:35No! Indeed! Oh, look at that shot right there! Talk about power!
18:41The office call from WWF, and they go,
18:44we'd like to put you and Earthquake together.
18:48Jimmy Hart will be your manager,
18:50you will be Typhoon, and he will be Earthquake,
18:53the natural disasters.
18:55I thought it was a great deal for Fred to transition,
18:58because those two guys together were monsters.
19:02852 pounds combined weight!
19:06Got to be a record!
19:08We wrestled John and Fred a lot,
19:10but you had to change your whole game plan up,
19:13because you weren't throwing these guys in the rope
19:15and power bombing them,
19:17or you go to give them a double tackle,
19:18but me and Donaldson both get knocked on our ass, you know.
19:21You let Fred do his strongman stuff,
19:23the weight could work with anybody.
19:25They were just another notch,
19:26one of the greatest teams we wrestled.
19:28You got the Earthquake, and you got Typhoon.
19:30In that kind of weather, you shouldn't be wrestling.
19:32You're out and done!
19:35One, two, three!
19:38I can't hear you! This is Stephanie!
19:41Chasing the dream, the champ deal, is awesome.
19:45And having it is awesome.
19:47But you may be in Connecticut today,
19:50or Madison Square Garden,
19:51and then you have to fly out to L.A.
19:53The schedule of the WWE was really brutal.
19:57Seven days a week, twice on Saturday, twice on Sunday.
20:01You're like an absentee father, sort of.
20:03Your wife is a stronghold of the household,
20:06and she's taking care of the family while you're gone.
20:09He'd be gone a month at a time,
20:11and he'd be home for a couple days.
20:13Clearly, it was tough on my mom.
20:15New environment, new country.
20:17She expected him to be home a little bit more.
20:19John was having a hard time, too,
20:22because I'm new to the place,
20:25so he's worried about me.
20:27Especially when I have Jeffrey and Juwan at that time.
20:32I didn't know who he was,
20:34because I saw him very seldomly.
20:37It was this massive giant walking through the door,
20:41and the person who's been with me the most
20:44is this petite, tiny Filipino woman.
20:47And I'm sure that broke his heart,
20:50which makes me sad to think about.
20:52The pressure there to come home is monstrous side, man.
20:57How much is too much?
20:59The answer is, it was all too much.
21:01But that didn't matter to me as a man.
21:04And there he is.
21:14There's my buddy, Quig.
21:17And I can't leave him by himself, you know,
21:19saying, so the disasters have to be together,
21:21spending some time.
21:23And we're equal opportunity smashers, okay,
21:25because there's money incorporated having a bad day.
21:29In 1992, the natural disasters dominate the WWF tag team scene,
21:37setting themselves apart backstage
21:39with their unique approach to life on the road.
21:42There were guys that their goal was about a strip club or women.
21:46Where's the party?
21:47John was neither of those.
21:49And Fred was neither of those.
21:51I wasn't ever really a big drinker.
21:54I didn't do drugs and that stuff.
21:56You know, I'd be with John.
21:57We'd go in the room and bullshit and talk about home life
22:00and stupid shit that we'd seen on the road.
22:03Sometimes it's better just to sit back and see it unfurl.
22:07They were straight up guys.
22:09You know what I mean?
22:10But the two son of a bitches could put some food away.
22:14You know what I mean?
22:15You know?
22:16Well, the plate couldn't hold enough.
22:18I'm like, Fred, you go back for more.
22:20It looked like Mount St. Helens or something.
22:23You know, but he would go back for four more plates.
22:26He's one of the greatest guys I've met in this business.
22:29He's very humble, always ready to give 100%.
22:33Plus, it wasn't bad having a guy his size covering my back either.
22:38They really became close friends, that natural disaster run.
22:41And it was a good run.
22:43At the beginning of 1993,
22:46the reign of the natural disasters comes to an end
22:49as John Tenta returns to Japan.
22:52That's probably been the problem with my career
22:55is that I'm impatient.
22:57And I just didn't see a whole lot going on.
23:00They had different tactics they wanted to push
23:03and we kind of got pushed to the back.
23:05And I just thought we were too big to be pushed to the back.
23:08Right.
23:09So I kind of took a hiatus and went back to Japan for a while.
23:13Fred Ottman continues to wrestle for the WWF until later that year
23:18when an unthinkable tragedy brings Fred home to Florida.
23:22I was opening two bars in Key West.
23:25My brother-in-law Randy was supposed to run the business
23:28when I was on the road.
23:30And my brother-in-law was out on the phone by that building.
23:33And there was some young kids that were there.
23:35And they start messing with a good friend of his.
23:38And Randy drops the phone and goes over to try to de-escalate the situation.
23:42Well, the oldest guy had a pistol and shot the gun.
23:48And he hit my brother-in-law and he dropped dead on the spot.
23:55And so with everything I had going on, there was no one to take over the business.
24:00And it took me off the road and not what I had planned, but you know, my family.
24:06While Fred struggles to help his family, John's work schedule in Japan takes him further away from his own.
24:13My dad at the time, the travel was starting to wear on him.
24:16My mom and dad got into a pretty big fight just because he wasn't home enough.
24:21It was a pretty big blowout, you know.
24:24My mom was just tired of not, you know, seeing him as often as she would have liked to.
24:30I remember that day like it was yesterday, man.
24:32In August of 1993, Fred Ottman makes his return to the ring for the WWF's rival, WCW.
24:40But soon finds himself at the center of one of the most embarrassing moments in wrestling history.
24:45While the cameras are live.
24:51The shock master was the gimmick.
24:54This was live TV.
24:56Tonight's special guests are Sting, the British Bulldog, Davey Boy Smith, and their mystery guest.
25:03It was Sting and Davey Boy.
25:04They're tagged up.
25:05And it was the Harlem Heat on the other side.
25:08And Fred was supposed to attack Harlem Heat or something.
25:11Hey!
25:12They're going to tell us before you get carried away who their special tag team partner is,
25:19brother.
25:20You're going to go down.
25:21The whole idea was that I was the mystery partner.
25:24Let me bust through the wall with this gimmick on.
25:26The true shock master was almost like a comic book.
25:29Like a Darth Vader head or something, right?
25:32Here, try this on.
25:33This is what you're going to wear when you go through here.
25:34It's got two little pin holes.
25:36Like little, little pin holes.
25:38Like this.
25:39At most.
25:40And then glitter is coming in.
25:43They built a wall that was 2x4 studs.
25:46You know, 12-14 inch on center.
25:485-8 sheet rock.
25:49Like a wall in your house.
25:50Now they didn't gimmick the wall though.
25:52They didn't score it or anything like that to make it easier.
25:55The guy came to the cue.
25:57He says, Fred, you're going to have to hit that wall hard, man.
26:01Do you remember the shock master?
26:03Shock master.
26:04Shock master.
26:05I can show it to you.
26:06Do you want to see what I'm talking about?
26:08Our partner is going to shock the world because...
26:12He is none other than the shock master!
26:17Look at the shock master!
26:20What the ?
26:22I go, what in the hell was that?
26:25Was that Fred?
26:27The shock master!
26:29All right!
26:30The shock master!
26:31The shock master!
26:32I told you!
26:33My love!
26:34Oh, God!
26:35Oh, God!
26:36Oh, God!
26:38Look at this, mother !
26:40Oh, my God!
26:41He fell down!
26:44It looked like he hit that thing and come down!
26:52What happened was I hit it so hard, like this when I went through the wall, it put me straight
26:57over like a teeter-totter at a kid's playground.
27:00Oh, oh, God!
27:02Oh, God!
27:03Oh, God!
27:04He was-
27:05He was looking for the...
27:06For the gimmick!
27:07Oh, God!
27:13They call me the shock master!
27:17What a lot of people don't know is that wasn't Fred's voice talking.
27:22It was only Anderson with his growly voice was on a microphone.
27:27Come after me, Sid. I'm ready.
27:31Is this the end of it?
27:33We might as well. We can't top this one here.
27:39Fred, I still love you.
27:41I've never seen that shit before.
27:51He was going to crush people or shock them, whatever he was going to do, but he fell.
27:56And that was the end of that.
27:58The Shockmaster.
27:59It was horrendous, but you know what?
28:02You can turn a negative into a positive.
28:04It's been very, very good to me.
28:06That's the classic Shockmaster.
28:08It made an internet sensation out of Fred falling through the wall.
28:12So if there'd be like a plane crash and Fred ran in and saved like all the school kids out of the plane and before it blew up,
28:20he'd still be remembered as Shockmaster there.
28:24It's funny as shit.
28:26Oh my goodness.
28:27A former star for Vince McMahon's WWF, John Tenta has grown disillusioned with the company
28:44and the toll its aggressive schedule took on his family.
28:49Then I wasn't so pleased at the time with the financial situation, so I called WCW.
28:56I think that he was ready to find a solution that would allow him to be with his family more.
29:01And I think at that time, WCW kind of threw him the life raft.
29:04They gave him such big contracts and less working days on the road.
29:10We moved from Canada to Florida so that my dad could have more time at home.
29:19It was so easy to be around him, to be around family, and just to enjoy each other.
29:25Whether it was something like going to Disney or it was a Thursday night and I popped in a laser disc so we could sing karaoke.
29:32He is a karaoke king, man.
29:36House of the Rising Sun was one of his favorite songs they sing.
29:42We sing together and we like the duet of endless love.
29:46When my dad was home, he showed up to any event, any show, any game, anything that we had going on.
29:58That was a nice base hit there.
30:00He was all about making memories and doing things with the family.
30:03That's awesome.
30:04Thank you, sweetie.
30:05But as John's family life is solidified, his career in the ring is coming apart.
30:11Introducing first, Avalanche!
30:15The WCW couldn't use the earthquake name, so he came in as Avalanche.
30:20Vince McMahon owned the name Earthquake.
30:23You go out there and change your name and everything, it confuses the fans.
30:28The Avalanche was too close to Earthquake.
30:29And so that'd be kind of infringing on that trademark.
30:34So unfortunately, that gimmick didn't last very long.
30:38After Avalanche, we all got graced with Shark, which he absolutely hated.
30:43Did they put a fin on him?
30:45I thought to myself, that's f***ing stupid.
30:48He did it just because, you know, it's supporting the family.
30:51Once again, it's a job.
30:53You know, he's going to do what he needs to do to make it work and be all in on it.
30:57You know, at that time, I was still about 430 pounds.
31:00There were a few people, southern beached whales, stuff like that.
31:04I just think maybe they just never could get the right character that they wanted out of him.
31:12After a year of portraying the shark in WCW,
31:15John finally gets the opportunity to define himself in the ring.
31:19I'm not the shark.
31:20I'm not a fish.
31:22I'm not an Avalanche.
31:24I'm a man.
31:26John Tenta.
31:28Very much felt like it was his mic drop moment with all of these gimmicks.
31:34The bottom line is he was never given the storylines that he had in the WWE.
31:39He was never put in the position to make money in WCW.
31:43He was just used.
31:45But in 1998, during what is supposed to be his triumphant return to the WWF,
31:51John Tenta is forced into his oddest gimmick yet.
31:54The Golga character was a member of the oddities, where you had Luna Vachon, Kurgan, and Giant Silva.
32:01He had this huge Hartman doll that he brought out to the ring with him.
32:08He was under a mask.
32:10Putting John under a mask was just humiliation.
32:14They didn't want him to get the kudos that he would have had if they just ran him out there as Earthquake.
32:21They wanted to do something that was just grotesque.
32:24Even when he was in the Shark or the Avalanche, he was an Earthquake.
32:29Even when he was Golga, he was an Earthquake.
32:31Everybody wanted Earthquake back.
32:33All these other gimmicks were just trying to get back to, you know, his glory days.
32:38When Golga ran its course, you couldn't go back to the WCW.
32:42Where else did he go?
32:45Which is likely why that sparked his wrestling school that he opened up in Sanford.
32:50It didn't work out.
32:52It's like always money coming out, but nothing's really coming in.
32:55We had a bankruptcy.
32:58Everything changed.
33:00He has the school for maybe I will say a year or under a year.
33:04And then he started doing the retail.
33:08He got a job at the mall.
33:10He worked in the big and tall section.
33:13And, you know, he'd have fans recognize him.
33:15Dude was working in the men's department, you know, sweating his ass off.
33:20It is incredibly hard to go from being a superstar to working retail somewhere.
33:29John was going to make a living for his family, regardless of what he was.
33:34If he had to shovel shit, he'd do it, provide for his family.
33:39After my dad left retail, he started truck driving.
33:42He saw it as an opportunity to make a little bit more money.
33:45You know, it wasn't a glamorous job.
33:47He would be, you know, peeing in gallon jugs because he just don't have time to stop at a truck stop.
33:52And he started to notice that there were blood clots in his urine and he was on the road.
33:57And so he wasn't able to get to a doctor very quickly.
34:01And he kind of kept it a secret from my mom for a little while.
34:03He kind of got away with letting this thing, this tumor in his bladder grow for longer than it should have.
34:12When he went to the doctor, he gave him a very short prognosis and said that there wasn't anything that they were going to be able to do.
34:20He said it was already advanced too far.
34:22It's already too late because the size of the tumor is like a baseball size.
34:27After being diagnosed with advanced bladder cancer, John Tanta and his wife must break the news to their children.
34:43My parents sat me and my siblings down and they said that my dad had cancer and that they were going to Houston for a second opinion.
34:57There were a lot of tears and a lot of worry and fear.
35:02My sister works in healthcare and she told me that bladder cancer is one of the most curable cancers.
35:12And so for that to take him down because he was away from home or he kept it a secret, it's a bummer to hear.
35:21It definitely sucked.
35:22He felt like if he was still wrestling, they might have caught it earlier.
35:26So he might have had a fighting chance.
35:28I walked in on him, sitting at the edge of the bed, watching some old tapes.
35:35There were VHS tapes all over the floor and I heard him laughing.
35:39And he was watching the segment on primetime.
35:41He was quoting himself in the segment.
35:44He was loving it.
35:45He was making himself laugh with the jokes that he was telling.
35:48I do think that my dad was kind of forged to be tough.
35:52And it's funny, you think like, oh, you just got to fight as hard as you can.
35:55But it's so much more than that, right?
35:56It's not like he could do a body slam to the tumors in his bodies.
36:01As one of the wrestling world's most imposing figures takes on the battle of his life,
36:07do you in the business even know of his struggle?
36:10John, I wish that you told me that you needed help.
36:18In the summer of 2005, gosh, my dad looked actually great that summer.
36:42He looked a lot like himself.
36:45He was going through chemo and all that stuff.
36:47And, you know, they still had high hopes that they were going to beat it.
36:51And I was getting married that June 2005.
36:56Before the wedding, he called me on the phone.
37:00He says, Fred, the cancer is back, you know.
37:05We're trying to see if it can be fixed, you know.
37:09So we didn't tell the kids.
37:11At the wedding, my brother and his wife had the karaoke machine set up.
37:18And one of my mom's songs to my dad is, You Needed Me.
37:24And so she was starting to sing that song.
37:28And kind of halfway through, she just started breaking down and crying.
37:33My dad came to my mom and they had that crying session,
37:39just hugging each other and crying.
37:43Love him so much.
37:46When you love someone, nothing is hard
37:49as long as you're with that person that you love.
37:55At that point, they pretty much figured it was, you know, game over for my dad.
38:03Just before his eldest son, Jeff's wedding,
38:14John Tenta learns that the cancer has spread throughout his body.
38:19You know, looking back, it's not shocking that he wasn't quick to tell us.
38:22Maybe, maybe he knew it was bad from the beginning.
38:25And, you know, was just trying to stretch out as much time as he could.
38:31And I told him that.
38:33Don't you worry.
38:39The kids and I are going to be okay.
38:43So if it's time, he can go.
38:49But before he closed his eyes, one by one, they talk to him.
38:54I couldn't stop thanking him for the life that he's been able to give us, you know, give me.
39:01He didn't need to take me along, but he did anyways.
39:05And I greatly appreciated everything that he's done, made me a better person, better man, you know.
39:11I told him how much I loved him.
39:15I told him, thank you for being such a great dad.
39:23And I remember just throwing myself on top of him one more time and giving him one more hug.
39:33My dad loved to laugh.
39:44And so anytime he would tell a joke, or if he would tease my mom, or if he saw me from across the room, he'd flash a wink at me.
39:52And so I remember when it was my turn to go in.
40:02I went to go and talk to him.
40:03I don't remember what I said, but he winked at me.
40:07In his final moments, he was looking at each of us in the room and locking eyes with us.
40:19And my dad died while I was holding his hand.
40:25He passed away on June 7, 2006, which was just, gosh, a couple weeks from his 43rd birthday.
40:35And a couple months before his first grandkid.
40:39So.
40:41You can never forget about it, you know.
40:46It's still hard.
40:48It was Fred who called me about John.
40:51But those calls for our era of guys happened too many times.
40:59Too many times.
41:01It was just horrible to hear it because he was such a sweet man.
41:05John Tenta was laid to rest in Houston, Texas, surrounded by the love of his family.
41:11But without any representation from the business he devoted himself to for over 20 years.
41:16There's no wrestlers.
41:20No flowers from the boss.
41:26The amount of work that my dad had put out there for the amount of punishment he put, you know, his body through for entertainment and for his bosses.
41:38And I just wish that they would have, you know, tried a little harder to reach out to him and to show more love.
41:45Because he was a gentle giant and he would have done anything for anybody.
41:50John and Jimmy Hart and my brother, who just passed away last July.
41:55We were a family on the road.
41:57We were a family on the road.
41:57This was my family.
42:00Talking about Inanna is heartbreaking for me when you lose a good friend like that.
42:07I will always remember John because this is my sumo brother here.
42:12And that's how I am going to remember John forever.
42:16Brother.
42:18He should be remembered as a wrestler who lived the fullest.
42:24You know, he came to Japan and he had a very healthy, good run as a professional wrestler.
42:29I stopped watching wrestling for years and recently I've now been more interested in watching my dad's matches.
42:38I feel a sense of pride.
42:40I can watch them and I can be amazed that my dad did that.
42:45He is a true legend.
42:47Not just for his talent.
42:48Him as a person.
42:50He was the entire package.
42:52I love you, brother.
42:55I love you.
42:56What is that picture of mom and dad right there?
43:00Johnny's my love of my life.
43:02My soulmate.
43:06Well, this is the first picture of him and me.
43:09And he wrote something in the back too.
43:11So this was in 1986.
43:15What does it say on the back?
43:17Would you like to?
43:19This is our first picture taken together.
43:23I was so happy being with you.
43:25It made me feel so good.
43:27I can hardly wait until we are together all the time.
43:33Always remember.
43:36I love you, John.
43:39If you look up to the heaven, you're going to see him smiling.
43:45To see how the kids turned out.
43:49He's proof that you can be nice and work really hard.
43:54And leave an impact.
43:58My dad was many things to many different people.
44:02But to us, he was just a great dad.
44:05Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:07Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:08Yeah.
44:09Yeah.
44:09Yeah.
44:09Yeah.
44:10Yeah.
44:10Yeah.
44:10Yeah.
44:11Yeah.
44:11Yeah.
44:12Yeah.
44:12Yeah.
44:12Yeah.
44:12Yeah.
44:13Yeah.
44:13Yeah.
44:14Yeah.
44:14Yeah.
44:14Yeah.
44:15Yeah.
44:15Yeah.
44:16Yeah.
44:16Yeah.
44:17Yeah.
44:18Yeah.
44:18Yeah.
44:19Yeah.
44:20Yeah.
44:20Yeah.
44:21Yeah.
44:22Yeah.
44:23Yeah.
44:24Yeah.
44:25Yeah.
44:26Yeah.
44:27Yeah.
44:28Yeah.
44:29Yeah.
44:30Yeah.
44:31Yeah.
44:32Yeah.